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Summer Vacations, Part 1 |
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After losing my job in May, the first vacation I decided to take was actually to visit some friends in Northeastern Oklahoma over the Memorial Day Weekend. I'll talk about that trip later. Today, I want to talk about my trip to Big Bend National Park, located a mere 600+ miles (9-hour drive) away in the desert of West Texas. I had wanted to visit Big Bend for quite a long time. My Dad and I talked of trekking out that way, but never did it. So, this past June, I decided to go for it. Finally. Big Bend gets its name because it is located in the Big Bend of the Rio Grande River. No-brainer, huh? The park is HUGE! And, while it appears to be void of thriving life, there are several species of birds, reptiles and mammals that live there though not many of the animals roam the desert during the day. We ran across few humans, some deer, roadrunners, vultures, ants, falcons and at least one rattlesnake. The Park Rangers informed us that there were indeed bears and bobcats in the vicinity as well. I'm happy we didn't meet any of the more hostile critters. Umm... I just remembered that on our way to the drop-in point for our canoe trip, we had to stop because there was a rattlesnake sunning itself in the road. Apparently, afraid the snake might get run over - the traffic was scarce at best, our tour guide thought it best to shoo the snake off the busy road. Right. We were probably the ONLY people who drove that road ALL DAY! Anyway, I stayed inside while the two men of the group got out to do the shooing. Well, they shooed and shooed, poked at it with a stick or something, finally making Rattlesnake angry enough that it reared up and feinted a strike towards one of them. There was some commotion back there while Rattlesnake decided what it wanted to do for REAL. Finally, it slithered off the road. Good thing for the shooers. |
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Empty road for miles... Driving the last 100 miles into the park, we quite literally saw only a handful of people. We probably saw more cattle than humans. Upon entering the park from the north, we had to drive roughly 40 miles due south to reach the Chisos Mountains Basin where we were staying at the lodge/motel. I steadfastly refused to do any camping, as that meant toting tents, food, sleeping gear, clothing, and a portable toilet. We would have had to pack out all our waste, ALL OF IT including the human refuse. ICK! Fortunately, my traveling companion felt the same way - we're on VACATION and that was just going to be too much work! So, we stayed in the motel, which gave us a really nice view of the Chisos Mountains. That was about all we had to look at since there was no TV. No telephone in the room, either. |
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The Chisos Mountains - I was about 25 miles from the base of the mountains when I took this picture. The first full day we spent in the park, we traveled to the western edge, stopping along the way at many of the exhibits to take in and snap a few pictures of the view. We went outside the park to one of the tour groups in order to arrange for a canoe trip the next day, if possible. After paying and confirming our reservations, I left the place saying, "Remember, I'm on vacation. I don't want to work TOO hard, okay?" The tour folks laughed. I didn't take it as a promising sign. We worked our way back to the lodge, stopping to view the Santa Elena Canyon and the cliff walls along the Rio Grande. |
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To give you some reference as to just how BIG the canyon is - how TALL the walls are,
we were over a mile away from the canyon when I took this picture.
We ate lunch at the Castalon Ghost Town. It was incredibly hot, and the sun was magnificently BRIGHT!
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An abandoned carriage - Castalon Ghost Town. When we made it back to our room, we decided a cool shower was in order and then a nap before dinner. The heat was draining. Yes, it was a "dry" heat, but whenever the temperature reaches 105 or more, trust me, it's HOT! After dinner, we sat outside and enjoyed the sunset, which was nothing short of awesome. |
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Sunset, taken from the Chisos Mountains Window Overlook The next day we got up very early, before it was a billion degrees, and we went on our canoe tour up the Rio Grande into the Santa Elena Canyon whose walls are about 1500 feet high. It was SO incredible standing at the bottom of the canyon and looking up at all that history! WOW! |
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This "face" in the canyon wall caught my attention. Okay, what wasn't so incredible was trying to paddle the damn canoe in about two inches of water. We ran across that problem quite a few times. And, as a result, we had to drag/carry the canoe in several places. I managed to lose my sandals at least twice, having to stop and sift through the silt to find them. It was quite a lot of work, but overall we had a good time. We traveled about 2.5-3 miles upstream before we stopped for a lunch of sandwiches, fruit, chips and drinks. |
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How the canyon looked from the rear of the canoe, when I was supposed to be paddling! After we ate, we took a little hike up a side canyon [the Mexico side of the river] to a canyon fed water hole. Amazing. It was absolutely amazing! That area probably has not been truly disturbed in many, many years, except for the occasional hiker like us - it wasn't easy getting to this point, really. We went further, but there was running water we had to climb through, so I wasn't able to take my camera, but it was truly beautiful. |
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Water Hole The entire time I was in Big Bend, the beauty of the desert constantly amazed me. It's certainly a very harsh environment in which to survive, but WOW! It was something else.
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